O'Connor to seek another year

Kerry manager: Jack O'Connor has decided to stay on as Kerry manager. The initial two-year term is over but defeat in the All-Ireland final to Tyrone has prompted the Coláiste na Sceilge schoolteacher to seek another year in charge.

After meeting over the weekend, his management team of Ger O'Keeffe, Johnny Culloty and trainer Pat Flanagan have also agreed to return.

The decision must be ratified next Tuesday but senior sources in the county board indicated this would be a formality. "We have advised the county board of our wishes to stay on, so it is up to them now," said an understandably cautious O'Keeffe.

O'Connor was unavailable for comment yesterday but O'Keeffe gave some insight into the reasoning behind the change in mindset, after O'Connor strongly implied on RTÉ television last week that he would not be back in 2006.

"I suppose it came down to unfinished business," continued O'Keeffe. "Our first reaction was to go leave it to somebody else but then you think there was only a score in it at the end.

"Tyrone have improved dramatically from 2003, so have we, but the bar has been raised higher every year to the point that I don't know where it is going to end."

The current management team's record is impressive - 11 championship wins, one draw (Limerick, 2004) and one defeat - yet despite two successive All-Ireland final appearances, and one title, Kerry have not beaten either of the standard bearers of the modern game, unquestionably Tyrone and Armagh, in the championship since 2000.

O'Connor last year embraced the defensive physicality now predominant in Gaelic football to guide Kerry football - at his first attempt - out of a five-year barren spell in terms of All-Ireland success.

However, they ultimately lacked the edge Tyrone had built up in the three battles against Armagh, two against Dublin and the other four Ulster hurdles en route to the final.

Kerry's passage to the final took them past challenges - Tipperary, Limerick, Mayo and Cork - that proved inadequate preparation for the intensity that awaited them.

Next year practically guarantees Kerry a chance to meet either Armagh or Tyrone before the All-Ireland final as Munster and Ulster will be paired off on the same side of the draw.

"Yes, to win next year we will have to beat two Northern teams and another from either Connacht or Leinster," said O'Keeffe. "We have learned a lot from this year. If you don't learn you should give it up. We won in 2004 by beating what was in front of us but this year we were beaten by a brilliant team on the day."

O'Keeffe labelled Gaelic football an amateur sport played by professionals. Nothing new here but Brian Dooher - quitting his job as a vet at the start of this year, to give full attention to the Tyrone captaincy - may become a role model for intercounty players with similar aspirations.

"Maybe it will come down to sponsors covering the costs of a player for the next 12 months and saying go on away and win an All-Ireland."

O'Keeffe also revisited the most controversial issue of the summer - refereeing. While not blaming referee Michael Monahan for defeat, he expressed concerns that the standard of refereeing is not on a par with the performances of the elite teams.

"It is so critical now. The standard of refereeing should increase. There should be no mistakes. The man in the middle needs to equal the team's efforts.

"We were on the wrong side of a few incidents in the final. I still don't know what happened in the Gooch incident but he was off the pace for 15 or 20 minutes afterwards."

Although 18-year-old Darren O'Sullivan displayed, in the final minutes against Tyrone, that the talent on the conveyor belt is as potent as ever, the immediate challenge for the management is to persuade senior panellists like Séamus Moynihan and Darragh Ó Sé to stay for another season.

"We will review that situation after the county championship. Some of them may opt to step away themselves. Sure, they have a lot of football played over the years. We'll see," said O'Keeffe.